SOCI 325 - Mental Illness & the Criminal Justice System

Credit Hours: 3
Lecture Hours: 3
Laboratory (or Other) Hours: 0

Prerequisite(s): CJUS 100 or a 100-level Sociology course or a 100-level Government course
Restriction(s): Students must be enrolled in a bachelor degree program.

Corequisite(s): None

This course will examine the tumultuous relationship linking the criminal justice system with the severe mentally ill population in the United States. We will examine the process of deinstitutionalization and how the closing down of the nation’s mental health institutions released thousands of mentally ill patients onto the streets of America. What were the consequences of this ill-informed policy decision? With little or no treatment resources available, our nation’s jails and prisons are now de facto mental health facilities and individuals with mental illnesses are conspicuously overrepresented in our criminal justice settings. This course will examine the criminal justice environment in which individuals with severe mental illness navigate - from arrest to longer-term incarceration to probation and parole - and the various treatment options and resources (or lack thereof) provided to this marginalized population by the criminal justice system while in prison and upon release into the community.

Student Learning Outcomes of the Course:

Describe deinstitutionalization and its impact on the mentally ill population and their contacts with the criminal justice system;
Summarize the history of the mental health system in the United States;
Describe the dynamics linking crime and mental illness;
Identify available treatment alternatives for the mentally ill;
Identify and describe the legal, procedural, and policy issues associated with a mentally ill person’s contact within each stage in the criminal justice process;
Identify and describe the roles of professionals employed in the criminal justice system who have direct contact with individuals diagnosed with mental illnesses;
Describe and explain the range of arrest, correctional, treatment, and release options available to individuals diagnosed with mental illness within the criminal justice system.